Pandora Premieres Offers On-Demand Music Before It's Released

As the battle to win the ears of a streaming music-hungry consumer base heats up, Pandora has just launched a new channel that lets you listen to new albums before they're official released.

It's called Pandora Premieres, and the company says it's a new way to discover music on the site.

Pandora Premieres lets users stream entire albums from both established and emerging artists for free. You can stream any track at any time, as many times as you like until the album is officially released. Pandora says that they will offer a new selection of upcoming albums each week, and some will come with additional exclusive content such as video interviews.

"Pandora Premieres is also a new and unique vehicle for artists, both established and emerging, to reach and expand their audience. Seeing the impact of Pandora on the careers of working musicians continues to be one of the most gratifying parts of this experience," says Pandora's Tim Westergren.

The service is kicking off today with John Fogerty's new album Wrote of Song for Everyone and Laura Marling's Once I was an Eagle. You can stream these albums, on-demand, for a week.

It's unclear at this point what kind of albums Pandora will offer with Premieres. If they end up offering pre-streams of high-profile artists, it could be a great addition to the Pandora service.